About the corporation and faculty of the Massachusetts Institute of technology are now declared convene. With this assembly, on the occasion of the commencement exercises of this institution for the conferring of its degrees, please rise further indication by rabbi Michelle Fincher and remain standing to join the corollaries in the singing of one verse of the starspangled banner. Rabbi fincher congratulations. And the jewish to, we have a specific blessing that is set on special occasions. It acknowledges that getting to any particular moment is not to be taken for granted. We are to celebrate enjoys times in joyous times, voice appreciation and milestone events, acknowledge our gifts and successes, and realize that we alone are not responsible for our good fortune. B rejoice and elevate those special moments, make them holy by filling them with words of gratitude and expressions of people in the expressions of humility. I share this blessing with you now. [speaking in hebrew] i also offer you a moment to reflect upon the many who helped to bring you to this day. The communities and individuals that have inspired and helped you. Your families and friends. Your teachers. Your coaches. Your advisors, your mentors. They have strengthened and supported your growth. The have believed in you. Have offered you patience, wisdom love. They have helped make you the person you are today. When you use your knowledge and gifts to fulfill the dreams that mic has for this amazing community, to work wisely effectively for the greater meant of the humankind you return all of the support the you ever seen, many fold. You pay it forward. As you go on to achieve, strive to become an offer this further blessing for your unfolding life , may all your learning lead to wisdom. May your labors lead to success. May your knowledge lead you to kindness. May the path before you be to blessing. May your studies never cease. May all your prayers be answered. Allmen. Oh say can you see by the dawns early light what we so was so proudly held at the twilights last gleaming. Whose bright stripes and stars for the ramparts were so gallantly streaming through the rockets that there red glare the bombs bursting in air gave proof that our flag was still there o say does that star spangled banner yet wave for the land of the free and the home of the brave. [applause] , please be seated. It is my pleasure to welcome to the stage, the honorable david moore, mayor of the city of cambridge and the person who addressed our doctoral candidates yesterday at the putti hooding ceremony. Mike received his phd from m. I. T. And has had a very successful career with nasa and is now at columbia. And, i am privileged to welcome our 50th reunion class. [applause] and now my honor is to introduce our commencement speaker, chief Technology Officer of the United States of america, megan smith. [applause] there is the public megan smith former ceo of the Lgbt Community in the early days of the web designer of smartphone technologies, working at google for 11 years where she led acquisitions of google earth and maps, and on the Leadership Team at google x, and also general manager of googles philanthropic arm. Now, as chief Technology Officer of United States, she serves as assistant to the president. The team is embedded at the White House Office of science and technology, which is led by another m. I. T. Alum, the president s science advisor. The cto Office Advises the president and his team on how to harness the power of technology data, and innovation on behalf of the american people. We think of megan as pure m. I. T. Not just because she majored in Mechanical Engineering. [applause] not just because she majored in Mechanical Engineering as an m. I. T. Undergraduate, class of 1986, or because she completed her masters thesis at the media lab. [applause] but, because she feels the polls here and has been one of the best ambassadors since graduating. I am told that as a freshman, megan showed interest in just about everything, and more importantly than her thoughtful leadership and Team Building abilities caught everyones attention, that must be why she is pursued by organizations to bring her wisdom to their boards, which includes m. I. T. Corporation, on which megan began serving just two years after receiving her undergraduate degree. Megan is also a great spokesperson for innovation gender equality and diversity, solving problems with stem engineering, just to mention a few of her areas. We are so fortunate that she can be with us today. Please join me in welcoming megan smith. [applause] megan smith members of the corporation, alumni, especially our incredible class of 1965, the wonderful m. I. T. Faculty and staff, amazing parents family, and friends who have supported this wonderful class, and to you, the class of two of the 15. [applause] i remember when the president would take the stage when i was in killian court. He would always note that we would welcome commenting from toddlers, happy or sad, during the ceremony. Speaking of kids, my boys are here today. They are inspired by all of you. As you know, we recently moved to washington, d. C. From silicon valley. One of my favorite experiences this is not the same childhood as yours is watching my son pull out the phone and ask siri, when is it going to snow . My boys were walking and got into arguments, as brothers do and he said, when my startup gets rich, i will not buy you anything. I like to call entrepreneurs on entreuprenerds. Your class speaks over 55 languages, and that does not mean computer languages. You are from families that have a longstanding tradition of university, and yet, many of you are from families that have never been to universities before, and youre the first in your family. Congratulations. [applause] i love history. It really informs a lot of my thinking. I think the often the old becomes the new all the time. There is a Winston Churchill quote that says, the farther back with you can look, the farther forward you will see. I want to begin today with our founding, our history, that of the founder of m. I. T. Think of the timing during the american civil war, the Industrial Age had dawned, but it was still young. Rogers wanted that university that would afford the opportunity to the future of this nation, and institute of technology. The story is a story of mind and hand. For any university, we would think about mind, but what was special was the way of learning with hands, and Teaching Laboratory based around and in the lab. Because we have had the opportunity to learn and as collaborative hands on environment together, i feel that much of my own history and future is built on the complement on the vast a compliment accomplishments of our faculty and staff who have invited us into their classrooms and labs. Today, i have some advice for you. Before i do that, i want to go back into history because it is relevant to the advice. There are many gems as we Wander Around this campus. We find i want to point out a very simple thing that is just down in building three. It is a plaque. It has a timeline of the first few years of m. I. T. That the library put together for us. I encourage you to go down and see it. You see a professor took students to the mighty lives in colorado and utah. The traditions that you see across the timeline are filled with foundations of what we are doing today. I will return to them. I know that the Chemical Engineering team [applause] mechanical engineers, i heard you. [applause] the flagship course that has now spread out across the world for learning. My favorite of the spinoffs is robotics. Im sure there are some alumni in the audience today. [applause] most notable is taking on a professors for taking on a professors initiative is margaret. I was lucky to have her as a teacher. She gave Research Opportunities to all students. Axis from day one. Yesterday, we were in the white house and tried to figure out how to best support all freshmen in any university or Community College to have research. It is very hard to learn to throw a baseball by listening to a lecture. That is the same with science and technology. We need to be in the labs. That is what you think about with m. I. T. , our strengths. We are good with discovery. We achieve things, solutions and collaborations. We get messy, we make mistakes. M. I. T. Is a wonderful research institution. These are all the great things, but what i wanted to touch on today is that this is not the full story of m. I. T. One of the most important things in our School History is something that is not in the motto. It is heart. What i mean by h itegheart is not just lovingkindness, it is openness, inclusivity, creativity passion, of session obsession, service. That is what i want to focus on today, the focus on the heart peas. When i was a student, i was excited and starstruck. I was focused on exploring and adventures. I was sometimes nervous and the roller coaster of confidence that you go through while you are in school. Despite some of those moments what i do know is i was excited from day want to work with everyone here. I have four main points for you today. The first aspect of heart is the importance of teams and teaming up. I was lucky to have alan, the founding director as an advisor in the media lab when i was a graduate student. He taught me some really in incredible things including that it is really important to know your strength and weaknesses. At many corporations ask you to write those down. Sometimes people focus on how to make your weakness is better. Alan had a twist on that. He said, i think you have to focus on your strengths and team up with people who are really good at the things that are your weaknesses. I think that is a cute insight. In our media, there is a great focus on founders. Take steve jobs, who is amazing but theres also joined hoffman a physics graduate of m. I. T. Who was the product manager for the macintosh. Her intense ability to see and debate with steve, together they made macintosh extraordinary. Last night i went into james warden and my friend is here today from the solar team. We were on the first team at m. I. T. , and i want to talk about the team its that we had the teammates that we had, and the incredible staff that we had. Dont tell anyone, but they used to leave the windows unlocked. Late at night, when they were close, we were able to build our solar car at night because of their insight and we were able to finish and race across australia. Thank you to the m. I. T. Staff that helped us. [applause] as you grow and we are reminded of our teammates and classmates, i tell you to go out and join other teammates in the world. There are many. The second piece of advice on heart that i want to talk about is kindness. Kindness is as important as knowledge. A friend of mine, a huge guy who came full circle from an extraordinary life of violence always used this expression. He found that kindness is not weakness. In fact, it is an extraordinary strength. It is not just a moral point, it is a practical point. People can get into bad habits of arguing and shutting people down. What if a half idea was the first half of a c cure for cancer. Unawareness can take the form of bullying. I have had expenses with people across cobra america who do not realize that they are being bullies. I really encourage you to make sure that the diversity of all of you are heard by each other, letting people help you, help themselves, being kind to yourself, being kind to others. Being open is important. That leads me to my third one which is about openness and inclusivity. Talent is everywhere. I hold an image in my head about this. I was lucky to go to afghanistan, and extorted a country, filled with so much entrepreneurial talent. One of the people who was helping us insecurity when we were there told us that when he landed he looked out the window and would see a little boy run out of his house and lay on the roof. He wondered if the boy was excited about the planes, why was he doing that. One day he was near his home and he went to visit. The boy was running out of the house to lie on top of the roof to protect his solar panel from cracking. I just think about him because i think about what he would want and what he needed, and to help him. Not all talent has access. Now, i will take you back to the timeline on the wall in building three. It highlights and exterminating in 1855. On the first year that m. I. T. Faculty taught classes to m. I. T. Students, they taught for free in the evening at the lowell institute. You can fastforward to today present day with the president and his pioneering coursework to bring all courses for free on the web. Yet, in the timeline, it is in our dna to be open to share. It comes from our very first year. There is another point on the timeline about openness. Oliver open all of our lectures and labs were open in those days. In the 1800s, Alexander Graham bell came to a lab. In our lab, open lot he invented the fundamental design that led to the telephone. Openness is important. It is part of our tradition, and i hope it is something that you will embrace, like that m. I. T. Faculty has. As internet comes to the young boys and girls in afghanistan that we can bring all of m. I. T. And he can join our community. I was able to work closely with the wonderful child and younger dont now who is fighting for girls and boys education. Her favorite subject is physics. [applause] the talent is right in front of is often. Often there is an inclusion point much of the bias is gone. If there are 10 qualifications for a job, on average, men often a fly if there are three, and women if there are seven. It is not mean anything is wrong with any of those pieces it just means that if you want to include everyone, you have to step up for the job. There also limitations with media and history. What people do not see in the film is that of the 10,000 talented people that saved 11 million lives in world war ii and shortened world war ii by two years, two thirds of them where women, technical women. You see them in photos. [applause] here in america, they were at m. I. T. And at harvard with an american, who we have mostly never heard of, who created computer languages. The foundations of modern commu computing developed. The six women the first programmers and our country. My friend who found them in a photo was told that they were refrigerator ladies, modeling the machines. No. Now, catherine johnson, 96 euros africanamerican, who calculated the trajectory for alan shepard, john glenn, and the Apollo Mission we did not see her in the apollo movies. Remember to include people. For those of you who are underrepresented in technology know that you have always been here. But in the photos and see yourself reflecting back. For those who have been part of the majority, remember to include these others. My last point for you my last emphasis of heart is where Barton Rogers started. Service. Bringing science, technology arts, and math through service. A lot of people asked the why came to government from silicon valley. It is very important that we are in environments like m. I. T. , silicon valley, and others where we are deeply together as technology people. We can move fast. It is also critically important to show up where we are more rare, where the greatest problems live. Our greatest goal is to bring t q tech to government. Many people are coming from amazon google, twitter. There are people who are site and have a voice of the main policy table. This is not just happening in america, this is happening in the u. K. , kenya estonia chile south korea. My hope for you is a you is a bring your Technical Service to the things that you love. Professor bose says bring your passion and work on the most passionate topics, you will be incredible. The september, the United Nations will meet and ratified the next 15 year goals for sustainable goals. I think many people here today will bring ideas to those 17 goals that are being set for our world. If you bring not only your ideas , but also your networks of the technical people out here, i think we will solve many of these issues faster than 15 years. Every morning we stand in the roosevelt room in the oval office led by the chief of staff. His expression is, this is a meeting, you are in a meeting, and he gets us to focus on what we have to do for the day. Anchorage you to get in the meeting and bring your talent and skills to that. We need your unique abilities. My last point that will make is that my math teacher when i went to m. I. T. Said, one of the greatest contributions you can make is not only what you will do, and you will do many things, but it is also to raise incredible children. I want to thank everyone around us for what you have done, and what you have created, and what they will do. [applause] you are breathtaking, class of 2015. Go celebrate. And then, take everything you know, take your whole self, team up, remember kindness, be inclusive, be open, make history in the infinite ways that your heart takes you. Thank you. [applause]